Which wasn't to say he didn't enjoy the educational part of college - he did. And judging from his GPA as well as the flattering letters of recommendation that had secured his place in graduate school, he was good at it, too. Especially at the music courses; there was something at once so fascinating and so instinctive for him there. There was such a sense of liberation, even just walking into Braun Hall - even if all he had to do was turn in a form or sign up for a practice room. He wasn't sure why. The large windows that let in California sunlight all day were nice, but if he wanted sun he could just sit outside - one of the many ways that California was better than Ohio, even if he did miss a white Christmas every so often. Snow and ice set a great mood, but who wanted to walk across campus - let alone home at 4 a.m. - in below-freezing temperatures?

So it wasn't just that the building was warm and bright in ways that no music department on the East coast - and definitely in Ohio - could ever be. It had more to do with a feeling of-...it sounded dumb, maybe, but a feeling of kindred spirits being together. And it was so much better there than in the business building.

That had been an ill-fated semester if ever there was one.

It had started the way all bad things did: with a trip to see his parents for Christmas. freshman year he had left the travel arrangements until the last minute,, not used to having to make the plans himself, and ended up sending the week-long break on an upperclassmen's couch; the fellow music major had taken pity on poor Blaine, who was being kicked out of the dorm after finals, couldn't get together the money for a flight home, and didn't have time to wait for a wire or a mailed ticket. The holiday had been awkward because they didn't really know each other, but with two roast turkey dinners fresh from the oven and a tiny tree on top of the tv console, it was the warmest one he'd ever spent. Of course, by the next year that guy had graduated...but Blaine had his own apartment of-campus here, unlike the dorms, he could spend the break watching Christmas specials and wearing comfortable sweaters while sipping hot cider. His parents, however - in particular his father - had other plans. An airline ticket had arrived in October, along with a note in his mother's empty, elegant script on the most formal of her three stationary sets, saying they missed him and expected to see him over break, since he'd been so scarce since moving "out there" and all.

His parents couldn't even say the name of his school; it was that big of an insult, as far as they were concerned.

By the time he returned to campus the day after New Years, he had been so peppered by questions from his father's professional friends and contacts that he was convinced he would never be able to survive on any career in the music field - at least, not without being one of those children: the overindulged children of old money types who ere despised by all the hardworking, suit-clad professional men in his parents' social circle. The type of child who remained dependent on familial assets and attempted leisurely pursuits instead of contributing to the family's burgeoning legacy. So he had tried his hand at being a business major.

Never again. Just- never again.

Blaine took a moment to bask in the warm afternoon fun as he walked from the student center toward his last class of the day. So far it seemed like the education-centered courses would be a bit outside his comfort zone...at least whenever he had to teach or demonstrate something that wasn't particular to music. Judging from his syllabus, he should be able to focus on his teaching skills on his preferred subject - and of course there were plenty of advanced music courses to balance things out-

"You were great on Saturday."

Blaine stopped, the praise coming seemingly out of nowhere. Smiling to cover his confusion, he turned toward the source, appreciation on his lips. Even if he never quite got used to people he'd never met feeling like they knew him - really knew him - he loved how seemingly everyone on-campus had heard him sing. His smile faded as he saw who was paying him the compliment.

He wanted to say he noticed the fedora first - black, wide-brimmed, it would be an easy thing to pick out at a quick glance. But his height, or lack thereof, was a distinct disadvantage as he found himself eye-level with a pair of thin pink lips. As the mouth curled into a smile that seemed far too fond for Blaine's liking, he jerked his head up sharply. He wasn't comforted by the fact that the green eyes held even more amused familiarity than the grin. He tilted his head up further until this eyes settled firmly on the line of stitching around the brim of the black hat.

"Wow, you were more gone than I realized," Gatsby laughed when Blaine didn't say anything - couldn't say anything. "You were great anyway. I'm Peter - I was watching from the kitchen."

Funny, Blaine thought; "Gatsby" suited him better. He was more dressed up today than on Saturday night. His grey tweedy wool plants had long, wide legs but still somehow didn't make him look short. Maybe it was the stark crease that ran all the way to his black, shiny, pointed shoes. The waistband was wide enough for three buttons and sat high around Peter's midsection. On top, he wore a sweater vest that was so light grey in colour it almost looked white, tucked into his pants. Beneath his vest as a shirt with the most peculiar cuffs and collar Blaine had ever seen: rounded at the corners, like a girl's Peter Pan collar, only much bolder than the unobtrusive feminine shape he as used to. these ere sturdy - stiff and starched; the collar stood up high on his neck before slanting down low around his grey and red tie, and the cuffs turned back against the buttoned base of the sleeve at an angle, sticking out slightly to form almost a cone around Peter's wrist. That no cufflinks held the fabric in place made the entire shirt even more peculiar.

And, of course, the fedora.

"I promise, I didn't follow you or anything," Peter said, grinning wide, and Blaine returned the smile warily. "I just saw you and wanted to say nice job - in all my years of even the best pub crawls, I haven't seen anyone woo a woman in song so well. Especially for how drunk you must have been if you're looking at me like you have no idea who I am." Peter prattled on like a busybody neighbour on some tv series, and it was off-putting coming from someone whose appearance was so put-together - eccentric, certainly, but intentional and clearly thought out. But for how quick his speech was, it didn't seem nervous at all - remarkable to Blaine, who felt like he could barely breathe or swallow.

It wasn't that Peter was the kind of person who would make everyone around him uncomfortable. He was clearly trying to be cheery and friendly. He was just terrifying. The feelings he produced- they never ended well. Blaine certainly didn't need any more indication that the fluttering in his stomach was the wrong response. But then when Peter grinned at him- the quiver inside him became a jump, a swoop, a clench - he swallowed hard and tried to return the smile, but he could feel how wobbly it was.

"I remember you," he replied, and Peter lit up like a Christmas tree - maybe one Al Capone would have, he guessed, but no less bright. There was an eagerness about the man formerly called Gatsby, an earnest quality at even the awkward conversation that felt-

Oh god.

The thought hit Blaine suddenly, seemingly out of the clear blue sky. What if Peter was happy to see him again - and happier still to be remembered - because he liked- Because he was one of them? If he was sick and thought-

No, Blaine reassured himself quickly. Peter was just friendly. There was absolutely no reason to believe that just because a male was a little eccentric, that he was deranged and would need to spend the rest of his life...even if Kurt had been. Even if his father swore up and down that they all were like that because anyone who wasn't crazy would just fit in like every other member of society. It took a truly sick person to stand out so blatantly, and anyone who didn't have to, wouldn't. Anyone who could control himself, would. Anyone who was a healthy, well-adjusted man would just live up to what society needed him to be. They would put away the strange hats and oddly-styled jackets and- and bowties - and interact with people normally, without craving attention and praise. And until those changes ere made...well. The man was still choosing to remain unwell, then, wasn't he?

Whether Peter was sick or not - or whether he, like so many other poor, retched souls, had no idea how ill he really was - didn't matter nearly as much as the fact that he made Blaine sick. with his easy, eager smile and piercing eyes and intriguing ability to wear a fedora well, he created such an undeniable curiosity that Blaine knew the dangers of all too intimately. Peter might not have a malady of his on, but Blaine did, and he couldn't be around people who made those revolting symptoms come back. Not when he'd worked so hard over the past four years.

But how exactly was he meant to leave? Point behind Peter and hope the young man was as gullible as he was well-styled? Excuse himself for no discernible reason in the middle of Peter's easy chatter? Wait until he came up or air and say he needed to get to class? That option seemed least impolite, at least. Of course, that meant that until Peter reached a natural stopping point, Blaine was forced to stay and watch him.

"I thought Janie was bonkers, asking me to a party where everyone else is in class together but me, but she says now that I'm back in the country I need to meet people again. I have to say, for how warm of a welcome I received, if I had the talent I'd move over to Music with the rest of you." Blaine wasn't sure how to tell him that the welcome hadn't been all warm. He didn't know how to break it to Peter that at least part of the room thought he was downright strange, and at least one guy thought- But Peter didn't give him an opportunity, adding, "I'm in the Classics department. Doctoral candidate." He paused, clearly wanting Blaine to jump in, but he didn't know what precisely to say.

"Classics," he repeated awkwardly.

"Basically it means I've learned every dead language a person can...and I irritate fraternity members by pointing out that their letters - and togas - are wrong."

Blaine wasn't sure why that put him at ease for a moment, like Peter was in on the joke of his own oddity. He knew people - at least a few of them - thought the guy in front of him was annoying and strange for whatever the story was with that toga party. Maybe he knew what people said about him, too, and at least that took Blaine out of the unenviable position of having to break it to Peter that people were saying things about him.

Not that it made the guy any less troublesome, Blaine reminded himself as he shifted uncomfortably, crossing his arms stiffly over his chest. It just meant that Peter knew people thought he was sick and dangerous and chose not to do anything about it. His father would have plenty to say about a boy like that; Blaine was sure because he had heard it all before, more times than he could count.

"I have to get to class," he offered stiffly, then so that he wouldn't be rude added, "It was nice running into you again." It was the opposite of nice; it was gruesome. It as agonizing in ways he couldn't put words to but that made him want to crawl out of his skin or- or destroy things, to feel his fists smashing hard against something. Not against someone's face - that would be cruel, but something he could beat and break so he could look at it and see something that was destroyed, damaged, unfixable...and that something wasn't him.

Homosexuals were violent as well as more generally disturbed, his father would take the opportunity to interject dryly, disinterested, like it was a fact on Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom. Like it had nothing to do with what the poor men felt, how they felt every bit as worthy of an asylum as the men who treated them might have suggested decades ago. They weren't in asylums anymore. It was all a lot less gothic and more medicinal, aimed at giving hope - hope of a cure Blaine was struggling so hard to maintain.

"Nice to see you again- I'm sorry, I didn't get your name."

Everything in Blaine told him to just walk away, to end this now before Peter could know him or find him - or, worse, find his secret. But that would be unspeakably rude... "Blaine. Anderson," he replied, shifting from one foot to the other. Peter flashed a wide, gleaming grin and extended his hand, which Blaine shook very stiffly.

His hand was broad, warm, with sturdy fingers, and the simple squeeze of a palm against his own sent an agonizingly painful twinge through him so suddenly that a gasp got stuck in his chest, and Blaine worried he might choke.

Peter had no idea. He never would, Blaine assured himself with a tiny amount o pride, as though being exceptional at hiding his misery was an adequate consolation for being miserable in the first place. As long as the man never knew how Blaine felt, everything would be okay because he couldn't do anything. if Peter knew...none of the options were really attractive.

"Nice to formally meet you, Blaine Anderson. I'll see you around campus - or whatever party Janie drags me to next." And then, in a flash of white teeth and off-grey sweater vest, Peter and his fedora were gone.

Frustrated with himself for engaging at all, Blaine let out a quiet sigh and trudged down the sidewalk and into Braun. After pulling his schedule card from his pocket to verify the room number, he ducked into the stairwell and up to the second floor, hoping to snag a seat by the window. At least there he could reap the benefits of his favourite building. He made it as far as the door when he froze.

There she was.

He racked his brain for a moment to remember her name - Lillian. Right. A beautiful name. She was just as beautiful bathed in the bright afternoon sunlight as she had been in the living room the other night - and in the moondrenched bedroom upstairs. That wasn't the problem at all. It was just-

She was gorgeous - stunning, really. And she was laughing with her friend, face lit up, and obviously she loved and understood music, and he should have wanted to ask her to go out on Friday night so they could get to know each other more...properly. there was absolutely no reason not to want to sit near her and use his smoothest lines and songs. He wasn't like those guys who thought dating was for suckers now that college girls were liberated. The idea of a steady was so perfect that he ached for it, and Lillian would have been a great place to start.

Instead, he found himself wondering where exactly a person found a fedora around here, let alone two.

When she looked up and caught his eye, he wondered if there would ever be a cure that could get him through even a single day without feeling nauseous. He forced a grin and quickly made his way to a seat by the window.

* * * * *

After an exhausting and too-dramatic afternoon, the sense of relief that washed over Blaine as he walked into rehearsal at exactly three minutes before 6 was overwhelming. He could feel the stiffness between his shoulder blades melt away and he stood taller, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet as he walked. The ache in his cheeks from trying to force a smile intensified for a moment as he grinned, and he could feel the tension dissipate slowly as the muscles got used to the new-again movement of actual displays of happiness. But most importantly, the tight bands that had been tied across his chest for too long fell away as quickly as if they'd been cut, and Blaine drew in a gloriously full breath. As he exhaled slowly, he could feel the rest of his body settling into a state that was half-relaxed and half amped-up for the rehearsal. After so much tension, the ability to breathe again - really breathe - left him euphoric.

The room wasn't full yet, but "college time" tended to run late anyway, so Blaine wasn't surprised. There were enough Mendicants there already to reassure him that enough members from the previous year were still dedicated to the fledgling group. Though he had been worried over the summer, it looked like their future should be secured, at least for now.

"Hey, old man!" Jerry called, grinning from ear to ear. "We were just saying we thought maybe your day was too full - and you'd need to get off campus in time for the early bird special."

Coming from anyone else, it might have sounded cruel, like Blaine was overstaying his welcome. Most groups on campus were for the undergraduates, even if higher-degree candidates weren't barred from joining. But back in May, when he had accepted his place in the Masters program after months of hemming and hawing, Jerry as much as anyone had urged Blaine to stay. Only two of the founding mendicants had experience in a cappella groups, he'd pointed out, and both were graduated. They should at least keep the one staying at Stanford for as long as they could. With Hank gone, Jerry pointed out, Blaine was the only one who knew what the hell they were doing.

He'd found the Mendicants by pure luck. Hank had been a Whiffenpoof when he was at Yale, and after he transferred he had been alarmed to find that a cappella groups didn't exist outside of New England - not even at their self-appointed "West Coast Ivy." When he started gathering fellows to join him, naturally he started with music majors and got John to join, who just happened to be talking about it as Blaine walked into their shared Advanced Piano class. Blaine's ears had perked up immediately at the words "a cappella" and he had - he was ashamed to admit - been uncomfortably close to begging John to let him crash rehearsal. Luckily or him, Hank had still been trying to find people, and he had been so glad to find someone else - anyone else - who had been part of a group like this before...

It wasn't the Warblers, sadly. In some ways, they were undeniably better. Musically speaking, the Mendicants were leaps and bounds beyond 18 high schoolers, some of whose voices had barely dropped. The repertoire, on the other hand, left something to be desired. Hank's songs came straight from the Whiffenpoof's' songbook, and while Blaine was sure Wes would appreciate the history lessons of it all, Blaine was used to something a little more upbeat than Ivy League standards from the turn of the century.

Music needed to be fun. It needed to be a release of everything, otherwise...

...Well, otherwise what did he have?

"You know you'd miss him," Fitz joked from over by the piano where he seemed to be studying homework of some kind intensely.

There was something about joking around like this that always felt uncomfortably fake. Phony. Bravado beyond what he could easily handle without a song to get him in the right mindset. He liked these guys - he genuinely did. They were cool and had a lot more fun than a bunch of boys in blazers, that was for sure. When they were all singing together, they felt like the brothers he'd never had - even like the fraternity he'd never pledged. But joking off the cuff like this was so...He hated to say dangerous. That was melodramatic and not really true. But none of it was easy for him, not the way it looked when others did it. Not the way singing was.

It had been that way with the Warblers, too, he always reminded himself. When they were singing, he was at the center of everything; when they hung out outside the Commons, going into town - anything out of uniform, certainly - it felt like he faded to the edge of the circle. But he needed to try anyway. He wanted to try; he wanted these guys to like him the way all of campus could. And maybe when he stopped singing, they could like him too. So he smirked and replied with exactly what the lead singer of the hottest group on campus would say: "You'd miss the girls I bring in, that's for sure."

The line wasn't perfect, but it worked: the room erupted into laughter. Blaine grinned, relaxing a little more, especially when the foreseeable competitive banter followed: Whether they could get girls without Blaine (probably not, but no one would admit to it), whether basses got more girls than tenors (they did), whether girls even knew what baritones were (outside the music department, no; music majors would slap them for even asking such an insulting question). But the ultimate unifying question came from Ted, a gangly second tenor who had never said much the previous year because he didn't get along so well with Hank but liked the music too much to quit:

"Does it even matter who gets girls?"

There was a stunned silence as the Mendicants looked at each other, confused. Of course it mattered. In a lot of ways, it was the whole point. There were plenty of places a guy could go at Stanford if he just wanted to sing, especially for students majoring or minoring in music of some kind, but performing for rooms of screaming girls was something only the Mendicants could manage. That reputation - and proven record to back it up - was how they had gotten half their members, especially after their first performance.

The first Mendicants performance was legendary at Stanford - though seeing as how it had occurred less than a year prior, perhaps "infamous" was more accurate. A group of boys - Blaine thought he remembered it being about eight, but everyone tried to claim they'd been at the first impromptu show so he couldn't remember for sure - had marched into the dining hall of the girls' dorm and serenaded the hundred or so girls with the song Hank had taught them: "Ride the Chariot." The audience had loved it; Blaine swore a few swooned as he looked at them...And when the song ended, they wanted more. Of course, the only problem was that they only knew one song. With the Warblers, Blaine could have improved something - much to Wes's horror - but not with a brand new group like this, especially since none of them but he and Hank had ever sung a cappella before. So naturally, with girls blocking the exit, they did the only thing a group of boys desperate for the attention of women could reasonably do: they fled out the window, sprinting across campus toward a practice room so they could learn another song.

That was the part Blaine really remembered - running across campus as fast as eh could, shoes slipping on the wet grass, beaming and laughing and panting, so eager to do that again as soon as possible because he felt so alive. He felt like a Beatle outrunning a mob of crazed fans, and it was the most invigorating thing he'd felt in years.

He didn't feel sick that day. For the first time in as long as he could remember, he didn't want to crawl out of his own skin and be someone else - anyone else - for awhile. He felt perfect. Invincible.

Of course it mattered who attracted women to the Mendicants. Otherwise they could be part of any other singing group.

"We should get started," Fitz suggested, glancing at his watch. At ten minutes past the time it should have started, and with at least a few members having evening classes or jobs, they couldn't debate the relative merits of womanizing potential by section all night. Thank God.

The group gathered chairs, sitting in a rough circle out of habit; Hank had always liked it, and Blaine had to agree that it was a good way to hold a meeting. If the Mendicants were going to be an egalitarian group instead of a mini-republic with an elected council, it did kind of add to the air of brotherhood Blaine really enjoyed within the group.

But no one spoke. Fourteen young men looked around the circle at one another, knowing the group meeting needed to start; no one knew how to start it. It didn't take long for Blaine to realize that the looks were no longer circling from one boy to the next. Thirteen pairs of eyes all focused instead on him.

Blaine drew in a deep breath and sat up straighter, trying to harness his enthusiasm as he said, "I'm really excited about this year. We had a great start last spring, and I can't wait to get started."

"So what do you think we should sing?" Ted asked, and a chorus of agreeing murmurs joined in.

Blaine looked around the circle, confused. "Isn't that something the group should figure out?" he asked.

"Please say no more ancient New England hymns," Jerry pleaded.

"What else is there?" Tommy asked. He was one of the youngest in the group and had been known around the department as "The Gilbert and Sullivan Kid" before joining the Mendicants because his great lyric baritone voice made him the go-to star of every local production.

"Barbershop," someone suggested just as another voice piped up "Doo wop." As the circle was starting to descend into cacophony, someone brought the group back to the real question. "What do you think, Blaine?"

"Shouldn't this be a decision for-"

"Why?" Ted asked. "You're the one with experience. You're the lead singer anyway. So why shouldn't you pick?"

Blaine perked up as, judging from the reactions around the circle, everyone agreed. They knew he knew what he was doing, and they trusted him. They respected him. He couldn't help but grin at that. 'Do you think it's a problem that I'm a graduate student? You guys are technically an undergraduate group."

"You've been in a group before, and you know how to arrange songs practically on the spot," Jerry pointed out. "That's why we let you stay in the first place."

"If you ask me, you should have been the leader last year instead of Hank," Ted grumbled. "But his group, his rules."

Blaine grinned, sitting up straighter. "In that case," he began, taking his new role very seriously. He had to; the leader of a group, especially such a young group, had to be able to steer the group with confidence and do what was best for them as a whole. They needed to have confidence in him and rely on him, and both of those would be easier if he was clearly not playing around with the group and their time. "I think we need to update our song selection. I don't mean everything has to come from last year's Billboard charts, but audiences like upbeat numbers they know. There's so much out there right now with great harmonies that it seems like a shame not to devote at least some of our repertoire to current music."

"Like what?"

There were so many songs he remembered performing as a Warbler, but none of them were memorable for the point he'd been trying to make. He remembered being talked into a duet on a song that was all about finding a place together - and the audience loving it for reasons that he couldn't fathom in retrospect. Hell, in retrospect he wasn't sure how they hadn't been booed offstage. It was Ohio, after all. The Warblers had been so naive back then. He had been- Anyway. He remembered a duet he'd pulled out of after falling prey to his illness, after doing the most unspeakable thing - the one that made his case so much more severe even if he regretted it immediately and tried to get away. He remembered leading solos and wanting to turn to see the boy dancing behind him because his case was so unmanageable at the time. And mostly, more than any other song, he remembered the one he had performed the first time he met the boy who had almost ruined his life.

He liked to tell himself that he hadn't given much thought to Kurt before he sang "Over the Rainbow." It was so much easier to blame everything on a song by one of his favourite singers of all time. But he'd noticed him before. He'd noticed him immediately - who wouldn't? Nevermind the way he dressed that made him stand out in any crowd, his strong presence - his eyes-

Blaine swallowed hard, trying to shake the memory. He'd fled to the other side of the country to get out of the boy's clutches, the least Kurt could do was stay out of Blaine's head.

He forced a brighter, more enthusiastic grin, wondering if at some point his face might just crack into a million tiny pieces and shatter, or snap like a rubber band that had been pulled too tight and too far for too long. "My senior year, we won with Rama Lama Ding Dong. And Little Bitty Pretty One. The crowd loved them both."

"We should do Beach Boys," Jerry suggested. "They have bad harmonies."

"You just say that because you're a first tenor," Tommy shot back. "What about Doo Wah Diddy? That already sounds like backup lyrics."

Blaine grabbed his notebook to jot down the suggestions. "Those would be great. Beach Boys might be a good thing to start with because they might not sound as good at Christmas."

"You know what song has a terrific background part and a fun bass line?" Craig asked rhetorically. He was one of the boys Blaine didn't know well - art department, not part of the usual party crowd, but he was usually the first of the low-voiced Mendicants to know his part. "Be My Baby."

There was silence for a long moment as the boys of the circle looked at Craig with a mix of confusion, disdain, and discomfort. "It's a girl song, dude," Fitz pointed out.

"So? We can take it down the octave. It wouldn't be hard to learn, and we wouldn't lose movement without the drums," Craig pointed out. "It'd sound fantastic, and I bet we could have it ready by next week. Beach Boys will take longer to learn."

"We can't do a girl song!"

"Why not?" Craig asked, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Girls won't like it," Fitz pointed out.

"Of course they will. They love that song."

"When girls sing it," Jerry replied forcefully. "When we do it, it'll just be fruity."

Blaine winced but recovered quickly, and he saw eyes begin to turn to him again. As appointed leader in the group, it was his job to settle this, wasn't it? But who exactly was he supposed to decide such a thing? On one hand, he did think it would be an easy song to arrange and learn - a quick but impressive number to start out the year and let the group reconnect to one another. But at the same time...the one thing the Mendicants really had going for them - the thing they really brought Blaine... What if Fitz and the others were right? What if girls thought a bunch of boys shouldn't sing girl songs?

It was more than that, though, more than just wanting to be sure he still had a supply of girls ready to swoon at his feet. Relating to women's songs was a sign of inversion - one of his own strongest and most pronounced symptoms that he could never quite write off as just loving all kinds of music including the quarter by girls. It wasn't merely fruity, it was sick. It was part of the pathology that he could never quite cure and reminded him of the voice he could never escape. The voice that sang Judy Garland so mournfully, that hit notes that took Blaine's breath away, that whispered his name just before they kissed, breathy against his lips-

He couldn't drag the rest of the group into that, no matter how good the Ronettes were on their musical merits. The three girls and Phil Specter's Wall of Sound weren't harmless for him - or for them. He needed to protect his groupmates as much as he could, and not just their reputations or getting sorority girls into their beds. The last thing he wanted to do was infect them with his sickness, to make them susceptible to all the problems... He suffered enough for them all.

"Let's start with the Beach Boys," he suggested, his tone definitive but casual, hiding all the turmoil of his decision behind a faint smile. "It'll be a crowd pleaser. Get everyone in a good mood even though summer's over."

The biggest perk of being a trusted leader, he discovered, was that the discussion ended there, with the Ronettes nowhere near their repertoire.

* * * * *

By the time Blaine headed home for the night, he was completely exhausted. Practice had gone great - they were well on their way to learning their first number of the year, and they had a list of songs to start soon. he would begin working on arrangements tomorrow. for now, he had plenty of work to do already.

He stepped into his dark apartment and walked blindly over to his desk, letting his bag slip off his shoulder and onto the floor with a resounding thud as he reached to flick on the desk lamp. The illumination didn't reach far - just beyond the edge of the worn-out wooden desk and threadbare chair, but Blaine didn't mind; what else did he need to see?

Tugging his bowtie and collar open, Blaine stepped over to the kitchen area. really it was no more than a sink, a small stovetop, and a tiny refrigerator against the wall closest to the door, but it was enough for him. The entire one-room apartment was built for a student who spent most of his time on campus and most of his money on beer, so that certainly seemed to fit the bill. He opened the fridge and leaned down to snag a cold bottle from the bottom shelf. Grabbing the bottle opener from its constant place on the square foot of counter space to the right of the fridge, he flicked the cap of easily and lifted the beer to his lips, groaning a little as the cool liquid filled his mouth. He moved back over to the desk and toed off his shoes as he sat down. It was difficult to find a place for his beer on the desk, the reddish brown wood surface already covered in bottles of varying ages and brands, save a horseshoe of workspace exactly the right size for a notebook. Blaine hesitated, looking for a better place, then simply nudged a few of the empties aside with the butt of his fresh drink, settling the bottle down at the edge of the nest of bottles. With a faint smile of satisfaction, Blaine reached down and tugged his satchel flap open. He rifled around until his fingers closed around the spine of a book, and he pulled it out to start his homework. Judging from the syllabi he'd gotten so far, it seemed like this year would have fewer assignments to turn in or exams to take, but a lot more to read.

After two hours of reading and as many beers, Blaine set down his book, leaning back and closing his eyes. He couldn't focus. Maybe he was just tired - he was done with three classes worth of reading, after all, and he felt like his eyes were starting to cross. And it had been a long day anyway...maybe he was hungry. Most of the Mendicants had gone out to grab dinner after rehearsal, but he couldn't. He claimed he had too much to do - which was mostly true, but homework had never stopped him from enjoying himself when he wanted to. Really he just didn't have the energy - not tonight. Not after spending all afternoon feeling sick and all evening feeling responsible for protecting the reputation and well-being of the entire group.

It wasn't that he minded being the group leader. He was glad they trusted him so much, and it was flattering - and, of course, he loved being a major soloist. He loved being able to sing his heart out with a dozen guys supporting him. But helping keep them all on track and together when he could barely keep himself out of trouble seemed like an unfairly tall order.

Even taller than Peter plus his fedora.

Blaine sighed dejectedly as the man shoved his way back into Blaine's thoughts despite being so clearly unwelcome. The first step in treating his malady was to not let boys linger on his mind; that as always the first real sign of a relapse. Well, that and the dreams, but he couldn't control those. Even deep hypnosis didn't work on dreams, so he'd come to terms with some of those being less-healthy than he wanted. But the conscious thoughts during his waking hours...that was what made him sick, if he didn't get rid of them.

He'd been doing so well.

Not perfect, not where he wanted to be, but so well. He had been able to tear his gaze away - mostly - and not get that fluttery feeling - much...at least, not while they booze was flowing freely at a great party - and he could talk to boys without wanting- well, sometimes, and maybe that was just because he tended not to talk to boys about anything but music. Though he didn't really talk to girls, either, he mostly just sang to them and touched them. But at least he had kept from doing either of those things to boys...for awhile anyway. Since his- how would his father put it? His severe manifestation of illness and inversion?

Just once he wanted those damned euphemisms out of his head. Just once he didn't need a running commentary of everything that was wrong with him while he warred against the perversions with all his might. He just wanted quiet in his head or once - for one day. Just one day of feeling normal and healthy and like maybe he wasn't going to be miserable forever.

He'd never made it a day. But he'd gotten a few hours' peace at a time on occasion. Given the right combination of a great party, with his favourite music, and a pretty girl flirting with him, and four or six drinks...the noise and urges could fade away, and he could imagine a life or himself: A small house, somewhere on a friendly street, with a yard and plenty of space for kids. Somewhere that looked lived-in, with a wife who greeted him with something simple but delicious for dinner - roasted chicken, no squab or cornish game hen. Pot roast. Spaghetti. Things families ate. And or just a few minutes, he could be drunk enough to imagine a fantasyland in which his father came on the weekends and saw how happy he was and was...proud of him.

But it wasn't real, and he doubted it ever would be. In any event, he wasn't drunk enough to get there tonight; it was too late, and he was just so tired.

It was too quiet, he concluded, setting his beer in the center of his desk. Moving over to the bed, he pulled out the most used object in his apartment - the enormous box of albums. Even in practically no lights and with a few drinks blurring his vision just a little around the edges, it was easy to find what he wanted. He pulled the 45 from its sleeve and put it on the turntable. As the familiar vamp started, Blaine leaned over to snag the half-empty bottle from the desk and laid on his back across the bed, staring up at the ceiling and mouthing along, too emotionally drained to even sing.

Oh yes, I'm the great pretender
Pretending that I'm feeling well
My need is such
I pretend too much
I'm lonely but no one can tell.

At least he wasn't the only one who felt that way. Unfortunately that didn't do him much good; the song neither gave him a solution nor made him feel enough better to live with himself. But at least it was a song by another man. It was a small consolation, but it helped him feel a little less sick for a moment. Knowing he had to take what he could get tonight, he nudged the mostly-empty bottle into place on top of his nightstand; it was even more full than the desktop, and he smiled faintly in victory as no older bottles or cups were sent clattering to the floor. That took skill, and it happened to be a skill he had. He flopped over onto his stomach, letting the combination of alcohol and exhaustion overtake him.

Maybe tomorrow would be better. He doubted it, but what else could he do?